The Critical Period of American History

Disputes about territory; disasters in the valley of Wyoming, 1784.

To these commercial disputes there were added disputes about territory. The chronic quarrel between Connecticut and Pennsylvania over the valley of Wyoming was decided in the autumn of 1782 by a special federal court, appointed in accordance with the articles of confederation. The prize was adjudged to Pennsylvania, and the government of Connecticut submitted as gracefully as possible. But new troubles were in store for the inhabitants of that beautiful region. The traces of the massacre of 1778 had disappeared, the houses had been rebuilt, new settlers had come in, and the pretty villages had taken on their old look of contentment and thrift, when in the spring of 1784 there came an accumulation of disasters. During a very cold winter great quantities of snow had fallen, and lay piled in huge masses on the mountain sides, until in March a sudden thaw set in. The Susquehanna rose, and overflowed the valley, and great blocks of ice drifted here and there, carrying death and destruction with them. Houses, barns, and fences were swept away, the cattle were drowned, the fruit trees broken down, the stores of food destroyed, and over the whole valley there lay a stratum of gravel and pebbles. The people were starving with cold and hunger, and President Dickinson urged the legislature to send prompt relief to the sufferers. But the hearts of the members were as flint, and their talk was incredibly wicked. Not a penny would they give to help the accursed Yankees. It served them right. If they had stayed in Connecticut, where they belonged, they would have kept out of harm's way. And with a blasphemy thinly veiled in phrases of pious unction, the desolation of the valley was said to have been contrived by the Deity with the express object of punishing these trespassers. But the cruelty of the Pennsylvania legislature was not confined to words. A scheme was devised for driving out the settlers and partitioning their lands among a company of speculators. A force of militia was sent to Wyoming, commanded by a truculent creature named Patterson. The ostensible purpose was to assist in restoring order in the valley, but the behaviour of the soldiers was such as would have disgraced a horde of barbarians. They stole what they could find, dealt out blows to the men and insults to the women, until their violence was met with violence in return. Then Patterson sent a letter to President Dickinson, accusing the farmers of sedition, and hinting that extreme measures were necessary. Having thus, as he thought, prepared the way, he attacked the settlement, turned some five hundred people out-of-doors, and burned their houses to the ground. The wretched victims, many of them tender women, or infirm old men, or little children, were driven into the wilderness at the point of the bayonet, and told to find their way to Connecticut without further delay. Heartrending scenes ensued. Many died of exhaustion, or furnished food for wolves. But this was more than the Pennsylvania legislature had intended. Patterson's zeal had carried him too far. He was recalled, and the sheriff of Northumberland County was sent, with a posse of men, to protect the settlers. Patterson disobeyed, however, and withdrawing his men to a fortified lair in the mountains, kept up a guerilla warfare. All the Connecticut men in the neighbouring country flew to arms. Men were killed on both sides, and presently Patterson was besieged. A regiment of soldiers was then sent from Philadelphia, under Colonel Armstrong, who had formerly been on Gates's staff, the author of the incendiary Newburgh address. On arriving in the valley, Armstrong held a parley with the Connecticut men, and persuaded them to lay down their arms; assuring them on his honour that they should meet with no ill treatment, and that their enemy, Patterson, should be disarmed also. Having thus fallen into this soldier's clutches, they were forthwith treated as prisoners. Seventy-six of them were handcuffed and sent under guard, some to Easton and some to Northumberland, where they were thrown into jail.

Great was the indignation in New England when these deeds were heard of. The matter had become very serious. A war between Connecticut and Pennsylvania might easily grow out of it. But the danger was averted through a very singular feature in the Pennsylvania constitution. In order to hold its legislature in check, Pennsylvania had a council of censors, which was assembled once in seven years in order to inquire whether the state had been properly governed during the interval. Soon after the troubles in Wyoming the regular meeting of the censors was held, and the conduct of Armstrong and Patterson was unreservedly condemned. A hot controversy ensued between the legislature and the censors, and as the people set great store by the latter peculiar institution, public sympathy was gradually awakened for the sufferers. The wickedness of the affair began to dawn upon people's minds, and they were ashamed of what had been done. Patterson and Armstrong were frowned down, the legislature disavowed their acts, and it was ordered that full reparation should be made to the persecuted settlers of Wyoming.4

Troubles in the Green Mountains, 1777–84.

In the Green Mountains and on the upper waters of the Connecticut there had been trouble for many years. In the course of the Revolutionary War, the fierce dispute between New York and New Hampshire for the possession of the Green Mountains came in from time to time to influence most curiously the course of events. It was closely connected with the intrigues against General Schuyler, and thus more remotely with the Conway cabal and the treason of Arnold. About the time of Burgoyne's invasion the association of Green Mountain Boys endeavoured to cut the Gordian knot by declaring Vermont an independent state, and applying to the Continental Congress for admission into the Union. The New York delegates in Congress succeeded in defeating this scheme, but the Vermont people went on and framed their constitution. Thomas Chittenden, a man of rough manners but very considerable ability, a farmer and innkeeper, like Israel Putnam, was chosen governor, and held that position for many years. New Hampshire thus far had not actively opposed these measures, but fresh grounds of quarrel were soon at hand. Several towns on the east bank of the Connecticut River wished to escape from the jurisdiction of New Hampshire. They preferred to belong to Vermont, because it was not within the Union, and accordingly not liable to requisitions of taxes from the Continental Congress. It was conveniently remembered that by the original grant, in the reign of Charles II., New Hampshire extended only sixty miles from the coast. Vermont was at first inclined to assent, but finding the scheme unpopular in Congress, and not wishing to offend that body, she changed her mind. The towns on both banks of the river then tried to organize themselves into a middle state, – a sort of Lotharingia on the banks of this New World Rhine, – to be called New Connecticut. By this time New Hampshire was aroused, and she called attention to the fact that she still believed herself entitled to dominion over the whole of Vermont. Massachusetts now began to suspect that the upshot of the matter would be the partition of the whole disputed territory between New Hampshire and New York, and, ransacking her ancient grants and charters, she decided to set up a claim on her own part to the southernmost towns in Vermont. Thus goaded on all sides, Vermont adopted an aggressive policy. She not only annexed the towns east of the Connecticut River, but also asserted sovereignty over the towns in New York as far as the Hudson. New York sent troops to the threatened frontier, New Hampshire prepared to do likewise, and for a moment war seemed inevitable. But here, as in so many other instances, Washington appeared as peace-maker, and prevailed upon Governor Chittenden to use his influence in getting the dangerous claims withdrawn. After the spring of 1784 the outlook was less stormy in the Green Mountains. The conflicting claims were allowed to lie dormant, but the possibilities of mischief remained, and the Vermont question was not finally settled until after the adoption of the Federal Constitution. Meanwhile, on the debatable frontier between Vermont and New York the embers of hatred smouldered. Barns and houses were set on fire, and belated wayfarers were found mysteriously murdered in the depths of the forest.

One nation or thirteen?

Incidents like these of Wyoming and Vermont seem trivial, perhaps, when contrasted with the lurid tales of border warfare in older times between half-civilized peoples of mediæval Europe, as we read them in the pages of Froissart and Sir Walter Scott. But their historic lesson is none the less clear. Though they lift the curtain but a little way, they show us a glimpse of the untold dangers and horrors from which the adoption of our Federal Constitution has so thoroughly freed us that we can only with some effort realize how narrowly we have escaped them. It is fit that they should be borne in mind, that we may duly appreciate the significance of the reign of law and order which has been established on this continent during the greater part of a century. When reported in Europe, such incidents were held to confirm the opinion that the American confederacy was going to pieces. With quarrels about trade and quarrels about boundaries, we seemed to be treading the old-fashioned paths of anarchy, even as they had been trodden in other ages and other parts of the world. It was natural that people in Europe should think so, because there was no historic precedent to help them in forming a different opinion. No one could possibly foresee that within five years a number of gentlemen at Philadelphia, containing among themselves a greater amount of political sagacity than had ever before been brought together within the walls of a single room, would amicably discuss the situation and agree upon a new system of government whereby the dangers might be once for all averted. Still less could any one foresee that these gentlemen would not only agree upon a scheme among themselves, but would actually succeed, without serious civil dissension, in making the people of thirteen states adopt, defend, and cherish it. History afforded no example of such a gigantic act of constructive statesmanship. It was, moreover, a strange and apparently fortuitous combination of circumstances that were now preparing the way for it and making its accomplishment possible. No one could forecast the future. When our ministers and agents in Europe raised the question as to making commercial treaties, they were disdainfully asked whether European powers were expected to deal with thirteen governments or with one. If it was answered that the United States constituted a single government so far as their relations with foreign powers were concerned, then we were forthwith twitted with our failure to keep our engagements with England with regard to the loyalists and the collection of private debts. Yes, we see, said the European diplomats; the United States are one nation to-day and thirteen to-morrow, according as may seem to subserve their selfish interests. Jefferson, at Paris, was told again and again that it was useless for the French government to enter into any agreement with the United States, as there was no certainty that it would be fulfilled on our part; and the same things were said all over Europe. Toward the close of the war most of the European nations had seemed ready to enter into commercial arrangements with the United States, but all save Holland speedily lost interest in the subject. John Adams had succeeded in making a treaty with Holland in 1782. Frederick the Great treated us more civilly than other sovereigns. One of the last acts of his life was to conclude a treaty for ten years with the United States; asserting the principle that free ships make free goods, taking arms and military stores out of the class of contraband, agreeing to refrain from privateering even in case of war between the two countries, and in other respects showing a liberal and enlightened spirit.

Failure of American credit; John Adams begging in Holland, 1784.

This treaty was concluded in 1786. It scarcely touched the subject of international trade in time of peace, but it was valuable as regarded the matters it covered, and in the midst of the general failure of American diplomacy in Europe it fell pleasantly upon our ears. Our diplomacy had failed because our weakness had been proclaimed to the world. We were bullied by England, insulted by France and Spain, and looked askance at in Holland. The humiliating position in which our ministers were placed by the beggarly poverty of Congress was something almost beyond credence. It was by no means unusual for the superintendent of finance, when hard pushed for money, to draw upon our foreign ministers, and then sell the drafts for cash. This was not only not unusual; it was an established custom. It was done again and again, when there was not the smallest ground for supposing that the minister upon whom the draft was made would have any funds wherewith to meet it. He must go and beg the money. That was part of his duty as envoy, – to solicit loans without security for a government that could not raise enough money by taxation to defray its current expenses. It was sickening work. Just before John Adams had been appointed minister to England, and while he was visiting in London, he suddenly learned that drafts upon him had been presented to his bankers in Amsterdam to the amount of more than a million florins. Less than half a million florins were on hand to meet these demands, and unless something were done at once the greater part of this paper would go back to America protested. Adams lost not a moment in starting for Holland. In these modern days of precision in travel, when we can translate space into time, the distance between London and Amsterdam is eleven hours. It was accomplished by Adams, after innumerable delays and vexations and no little danger, in fifty-four days. The bankers had contrived, by ingenious excuses, to keep the drafts from going to protest until the minister's arrival, but the gazettes were full of the troubles of Congress and the bickerings of the states, and everybody was suspicious. Adams applied in vain to the regency of Amsterdam. The promise of the American government was not regarded as valid security for a sum equivalent to about three hundred thousand dollars. The members of the regency were polite, but inexorable. They could not make a loan on such terms; it was unbusinesslike and contrary to precedent. Finding them immovable, Adams was forced to apply to professional usurers and Jew brokers, from whom, after three weeks of perplexity and humiliation, he obtained a loan at exorbitant interest, and succeeded in meeting the drafts. It was only too plain, as he mournfully confessed, that American credit was dead. Such were the trials of our American ministers in Europe in the dark days of the League of Friendship. It was not a solitary, but a typical, instance. John Jay's experience at the unfriendly court of Spain was perhaps even more trying.

The Barbary pirates.

European governments might treat us with cold disdain, and European bankers might pronounce our securities worthless, but there was one quarter of the world from which even worse measure was meted out to us. Of all the barbarous communities with which the civilized world has had to deal in modern times, perhaps none have made so much trouble as the Mussulman states on the southern shore of the Mediterranean. After the breaking up of the great Moorish kingdoms of the Middle Ages, this region had fallen under the nominal control of the Turkish sultans as lords paramount of the orthodox Mohammedan world. Its miserable populations became the prey of banditti. Swarms of half-savage chieftains settled down upon the land like locusts, and out of such a pandemonium of robbery and murder as has scarcely been equalled in historic times the pirate states of Morocco and Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli, gradually emerged. Of these communities history has not one good word to say. In these fair lands, once illustrious for the genius and virtues of a Hannibal and the profound philosophy of St. Augustine, there grew up some of the most terrible despotisms ever known to the world. The things done daily by the robber sovereigns were such as to make a civilized imagination recoil with horror. One of these cheerful creatures, who reigned in the middle of the eighteenth century, and was called Muley Abdallah, especially prided himself on his peculiar skill in mounting a horse. Resting his left hand upon the horse's neck, as he sprang into the saddle he simultaneously swung the sharp scimiter in his right hand so deftly as to cut off the head of the groom who held the bridle. From his behaviour in these sportive moods one may judge what he was capable of on serious occasions. He was a fair sample of the Barbary monarchs. The foreign policy of these wretches was summed up in piracy and blackmail. Their corsairs swept the Mediterranean and ventured far out upon the ocean, capturing merchant vessels, and murdering or enslaving their crews. Of the rich booty, a fixed proportion was paid over to the robber sovereign, and the rest was divided among the gang. So lucrative was this business that it attracted hardy ruffians from all parts of Europe, and the misery they inflicted upon mankind during four centuries was beyond calculation. One of their favourite practices was the kidnapping of eminent or wealthy persons, in the hope of extorting ransom. Cervantes and Vincent de Paul were among the celebrated men who thus tasted the horrors of Moorish slavery; but it was a calamity that might fall to the lot of any man, or woman, and it was but rarely that the victims ever regained their freedom.

American citizens kidnapped.

Against these pirates the governments of Europe contended in vain. Swift cruisers frequently captured their ships, and from the days of Joan of Arc down to the days of Napoleon their skeletons swung from long rows of gibbets on all the coasts of Europe, as a terror and a warning. But their losses were easily repaired, and sometimes they cruised in fleets of seventy or eighty sail, defying the navies of England and France. It was not until after England, in Nelson's time, had acquired supremacy in the Mediterranean that this dreadful scourge was destroyed. Americans, however, have just ground for pride in recollecting that their government was foremost in chastising these pirates in their own harbours. The exploits of our little navy in the Mediterranean at the beginning of the present century form an interesting episode in American history, but in the weak days of the Confederation our commerce was plundered with impunity, and American citizens were seized and sold into slavery in the markets of Algiers and Tripoli. One reason for the long survival of this villainy was the low state of humanity among European nations. An Englishman's sympathy was but feebly aroused by the plunder of Frenchmen, and the bigoted Spaniard looked on with approval so long as it was Protestants that were kidnapped and bastinadoed. In 1783 Lord Sheffield published a pamphlet on the commerce of the United States, in which he shamelessly declared that the Barbary pirates were really useful to the great maritime powers, because they tended to keep the weaker nations out of their share in the carrying trade. This, he thought, was a valuable offset to the Empress Catherine's device of the armed neutrality, whereby small nations were protected; and on this wicked theory, as Franklin tells us, London merchants had been heard to say that "if there were no Algiers, it would be worth England's while to build one." It was largely because of such feelings that the great states of Europe so long persisted in the craven policy of paying blackmail to the robbers, instead of joining in a crusade and destroying them.

Tripoli demands blackmail, Feb. 1786.

In 1786 Congress felt it necessary to take measures for protecting the lives and liberties of American citizens. The person who called himself "Emperor" of Morocco at that time was different from most of his kind. He had a taste for reading, and had thus caught a glimmering of the enlightened liberalism which French philosophers were preaching. He wished to be thought a benevolent despot, and with Morocco, accordingly, Congress succeeded in making a treaty. But nothing could be done with the other pirate states without paying blackmail. Few scenes in our history are more amusing, or more irritating, than the interview of John Adams with an envoy from Tripoli in London. The oily-tongued barbarian, with his soft voice and his bland smile, asseverating that his only interest in life was to do good and make other people happy, stands out in fine contrast with the blunt, straightforward, and truthful New Englander; and their conversation reminds one of the old story of Cœur-de-Lion with his curtal-axe and Saladin with the blade that cut the silken cushion. Adams felt sure that the fellow was either saint or devil, but could not quite tell which. The envoy's love for mankind was so great that he could not bear the thought of hostility between the Americans and the Barbary States, and he suggested that everything might be happily arranged for a million dollars or so. Adams thought it better to fight than to pay tribute. It would be cheaper in the end, as well as more manly. At the same time, it was better economy to pay a million dollars at once than waste many times that sum in war risks and loss of trade. But Congress could do neither one thing nor the other. It was too poor to build a navy, and too poor to buy off the pirates; and so for several years to come American ships were burned and American sailors enslaved with utter impunity. With the memory of such wrongs deeply graven in his heart, it was natural that John Adams, on becoming president of the United States, should bend his energies toward founding a strong American navy.

Congress unable to protect American citizens.

A government touches the lowest point of ignominy when it confesses its inability to protect the lives and property of its citizens. A government which has come to this has failed in discharging the primary function of government, and forthwith ceases to have any reason for existing. In March, 1786, Grayson wrote to Madison that several members of Congress thought seriously of recommending a general convention for remodelling the government. "I have not made up my mind," says Grayson, "whether it would not be better to bear the ills we have than fly to those we know not of. I am, however, in no doubt about the weakness of the federal government. If it remains much longer in its present state of imbecility, we shall be one of the most contemptible nations on the face of the earth." "It is clear to me as A, B, C," said Washington, "that an extension of federal powers would make us one of the most happy, wealthy, respectable, and powerful nations that ever inhabited the terrestrial globe. Without them we shall soon be everything which is the direct reverse. I predict the worst consequences from a half-starved, limping government, always moving upon crutches and tottering at every step."

Financial distress precipitates the political crisis.

There is no telling how long the wretched state of things which followed the Revolution might have continued, had not the crisis been precipitated by the wild attempts of the several states to remedy the distress of the people by legislation. That financial distress was widespread and deep-seated was not to be denied. At the beginning of the war the amount of accumulated capital in the country had been very small. The great majority of the people did little more than get from the annual yield of their farms or plantations enough to meet the current expenses of the year. Outside of agriculture the chief resources were the carrying trade, the exchange of commodities with England and the West Indies, and the cod and whale fisheries; and in these occupations many people had grown rich. The war had destroyed all these sources of revenue. Imports and exports had alike been stopped, so that there was a distressing scarcity of some of the commonest household articles. The enemy's navy had kept us from the fisheries. Before the war, the dock-yards of Nantucket were ringing with the busy sound of adze and hammer, rope-walks covered the island, and two hundred keels sailed yearly in quest of spermaceti. At the return of peace, the docks were silent and grass grew in the streets. The carrying trade and the fisheries began soon to revive, but it was some years before the old prosperity was restored. The war had also wrought serious damage to agriculture, and in some parts of the country the direct destruction of property by the enemy's troops had been very great. To all these causes of poverty there was added the hopeless confusion due to an inconvertible paper currency. The worst feature of this financial device is that it not only impoverishes people, but bemuddles their brains by creating a false and fleeting show of prosperity. By violently disturbing apparent values, it always brings on an era of wild speculation and extravagance in living, followed by sudden collapse and protracted suffering. In such crises the poorest people, those who earn their bread by the sweat of their brows and have no margin of accumulated capital, always suffer the most. Above all men, it is the labouring man who needs sound money and steady values. We have seen all these points amply illustrated since the War of Secession. After the War of Independence, when the margin of accumulated capital was so much smaller, the misery was much greater. While the paper money lasted there was marked extravagance in living, and complaints were loud against the speculators, especially those who operated in bread-stuffs. Washington said he would like to hang them all on a gallows higher than that of Haman; but they were, after all, but the inevitable products of this abnormal state of things, and the more guilty criminals were the demagogues who went about preaching the doctrine that the poor man needs cheap money. After the collapse of this continental currency in 1780, it seemed as if there were no money in the country, and at the peace the renewal of trade with England seemed at first to make matters worse. The brisk importation of sorely needed manufactured goods, which then began, would naturally have been paid for in the south by indigo, rice, and tobacco, in the middle states by exports of wheat and furs, and in New England by the profits of the fisheries, the shipping, and the West India trade. But in the southern and middle states the necessary revival of agriculture could not be effected in a moment, and British legislation against American shipping and the West India trade fell with crippling force upon New England. Consequently, we had little else but specie with which to pay for imports, and the country was soon drained of what little specie there was. In the absence of a circulating medium there was a reversion to the practice of barter, and the revival of business was thus further impeded. Whiskey in North Carolina, tobacco in Virginia, did duty as measures of value; and Isaiah Thomas, editor of the Worcester "Spy," announced that he would receive subscriptions for his paper in salt pork.